from the but-not-not-a-smart-watch-either dept

There are now tons of smart watches on the market, many from smaller players, but the big guys are increasingly moving into the market as well. While many are still not convinced of the smart watch concept, as a happy Pebble owner, I can say that it really does change my relationship with my phone (i.e., I use the phone a lot less, and am better able to stay informed on important things, without having to constantly pull out my phone). For me it's been pretty powerful. That said, for this week's awesome stuff, we're looking at three crowdfunding projects for things that aren't quite smart watches, but might interest some people who are curious about smart watches, but haven't quite made the leap yet.

The Sim

First up, we have the Sim. Rather than a smart watch, its wrist strap has three NFC chips built in, which can be programmed to trigger functionality on your phone. In many ways this is a lot closer to projects like the Pressy or the Dimple.io that enable outside forces to power your smartphone to do simple tasks like take a photo or open a particular app.

The Glance

Next up, we have the Glance, which is a little device that you stick inside your regular watch wristband, which acts just like a typical smart watch. In other words, if you like the notification features of a smart watch like the Pebble, but hate the actual look of smart watches, you can keep using your own, and just slide this little device into the wrist band. It's a "smart accessory" to a watch to make it like a smart watch.

The Modilillian Smart Strap

Finally, we have the Modillian Smart Strap, which is very similar in concept to the Glance above, except rather than being a device that you slip into any watchband, this is a watchband itself that you can attach to basically any standard watch, again, allowing you to turn a more typically designed watch into a smart watch-like setup with certain notification powers.

from the rant-on! dept

Earlier this week, we wrote about rumors that Elon Musk was going to free up some of Tesla's patents to encourage more people to adopt the company's Supercharger system. As we noted this shouldn't be controversial, but it was still considered as such. Elon Musk has now made the official announcement and it actually goes way beyond what was originally rumored. It's not just about the Superchargers, it's all of Tesla's patents. But, better than that, Musk explains why he no longer thinks patents make sense and even demolishes the one argument that even many patent skeptics make: that they're "still needed to stop big companies from copying your innovations."

As we've explained in the past big companies almost never recognize truly disruptive innovation when it happens. This is for a variety of reasons, including the basic innovator's dilemma, but also just because companies are so focused on their own things, it's tough to get them to realize outside innovation. Furthermore, even when they do copy, it's actually pretty rare for them to get it right. That's because, from the outside, they only copy the superficial stuff, and have no idea why something is really successful. And thus, even if they have the "exact plans" for the competitor's technology or process, they don't understand the little things that make customers love them. Similarly, innovators are constantly innovating, so by the time the copycat catches up, they're still behind.

But, an even bigger issue, as we explained before, is that having more viable competitors can also enlarge the overall market. So if a company like Tesla has no viable competitors, they're left educating the market and building all the infrastructure themselves -- and that's pure cost. Opening up their patents actually helps Tesla in the long run by (hopefully) spreading out some of those costs, and increasing the size of the overall market. This is what many patent system supporters just don't get -- but Musk clearly understands deeply.

He talks about how he used to be a patent system believer, but he's been converted in the other direction. And while he avoided patents at some of his companies, with Tesla he was convinced they were necessary, because "the big car companies" might just copy everything he's done. Now, he says, he knows that's not true, and he actually would prefer they do copy Tesla's work.

At Tesla, however, we felt compelled to create patents out of concern that the big car companies would copy our technology and then use their massive manufacturing, sales and marketing power to overwhelm Tesla. We couldn’t have been more wrong. The unfortunate reality is the opposite: electric car programs (or programs for any vehicle that doesn’t burn hydrocarbons) at the major manufacturers are small to non-existent, constituting an average of far less than 1% of their total vehicle sales.

At best, the large automakers are producing electric cars with limited range in limited volume. Some produce no zero emission cars at all.

Given that annual new vehicle production is approaching 100 million per year and the global fleet is approximately 2 billion cars, it is impossible for Tesla to build electric cars fast enough to address the carbon crisis. By the same token, it means the market is enormous. Our true competition is not the small trickle of non-Tesla electric cars being produced, but rather the enormous flood of gasoline cars pouring out of the world’s factories every day.

We believe that Tesla, other companies making electric cars, and the world would all benefit from a common, rapidly-evolving technology platform.

This is absolutely true and it's great to see it stated so directly. If only other companies were willing to do so. As for the actual way this will work, Tesla has announced that it "will not initiate patent lawsuits against anyone who, in good faith, wants to use our technology." That's not entirely putting the work into the public domain, but it's a good step. Years ago, I had hopes that Google and others would do something similar, but it has not come to pass. Google had made a similar pledge, but only for open source projects, and Twitter has basically given its own engineers the ability to veto any offensive patent litigation efforts by issuing their own license. But Tesla has now gone even further than both of them by basically telling any competitor to feel free to make use of its patents without worrying about getting sued.

Unlike so many other companies and company leaders, Musk appears to recognize the simple fact that innovation is not in how many patents you get, it's in how you actually build amazing products and services that people want -- and patents can often get in the way of that, rather than help it. It's nice to see him declare that so directly. He even took the symbolic gesture of removing the framed patents from Tesla's lobby wall. This is great to see and hopefully it will inspire others in the tech industry to put down similar stakes as well.

from the solar-freaking-roadways dept

For this week's Awesome Stuff post, we've got three separate projects that have something to do with alternative energy -- some more ambitious and nutty than others.

First up, we've got Trinity - The Portable Wind Turbine Power Station. Usually, when people think of personal alternative energy sources, solar is the first thought. However, these guys have built what appears to be a relatively small wind turbine power station. They describe it as portable, though that may depend on your definition of portability. If you have a big bag it'll work, but it's not something you'd slip in your pocket. Oh yeah, also, you need wind. Of course, since it also has a fairly massive 30,000 mAh battery, in many cases, it may act more as just a typical portable battery rather than a wind turbine. But, still, how often do you get to say you've got a wind turbine to charge your phone? Wind freaking turbine.

This project is over 150% funded... (up around $75,000 on a $50,000 target) and it's ending in just a few hours, so if you want one of the original batch, jump in now. It'll cost you $279 (at the currently available "early bird" level) which is certainly pricey if it were just the battery. But, if you're looking for a personal wind turbine, I'm not sure you'll do much better -- well, unless you want to build your own.

Okay, moving a bit more into more traditional alternative energy, there's the SPOR Solar Battery charger. Yes, portable solar chargers aren't particularly new, but this one seems nice and compact. The creators of this project point out that they were going for a Goldilocks-level solution -- something in between the chargers that are too big and bulky and the useless keychain-sized ones. This one is looking for the sweet spot.

This is already more than 1/4 funded (goal of $100,000) with a month to go, suggesting it's fairly likely to meet its goal. As I type this there are still some early birds left at $40, but after that the price goes up to $50.

If we're going to talk solar, why not go big. Super big. Crazy, ridiculous big. You may have heard about this project, because it's gotten some press, but some big dreamers are working on a project to build solar freaking roadways. If you replaced the roads with solar power, you'd be able to generate quite a lot of power -- as well as making the roads much smarter, including variable road lines, automatically melting snow and ice, and even analyzing and treating stormwater for pollution. It's a crazy ambitious goal, but quite cool too. As they repeat in their pitch, it's solar freaking roadways. And they've actually already received two rounds of funding from the US Federal Highway Administration, and a variety of other grants and prizes, including being chosen by Google as one of their "Moonshots."

Obviously, they're not looking to Indiegogo crowdfunding for everything they need, but they are looking for more support to bring the project closer to reality. And they're getting it. With three weeks left, they've already raised about $1.7 million, well over the initial $1 million goal.

from the a-different-look dept

I know that it was just a few weeks ago when our weekly awesome stuff post covered standing desks, and this week may seem similar, but these three crowdfunding projects are a bit different -- they're more about portable and modular furniture, some of which may be helpful as a standing desk.

First up, we've got the StorkStand, which is a pretty clever method for turning a regular office chair into a mobile standing desk. I've explored portable standing desks in the past, and there hasn't been much out there beyond the Ninja Standing Desk, which once was a Kickstarter project too. It's pretty cool, but always struck me as just slightly too big to really be portable on a regular basis. That may be the same issue with the StorkDesk (which, amusingly, appears to have been built at the very same SF TechShop where the first Ninja Desk was built as well). However, as a more portable standing desk, the Stork Desk definitely looks like it could be handy if you're not looking to drag it around on long trips or on a daily commute.

While the official price is $199, there are still a bunch of early birds left at somewhat lower prices. It's already raised about $20,000 on its way to $50,000 and with a full month to go, it'll likely hit the target.

Next up, we've got the Pillar, which is a portable notebook computer stand. It's pretty simple, but also looks nice and lightweight. The video more or less explains it all. I've already got a Goldtouch travel laptop stand, which I like a lot. And I know some folks really like the Roost (which was another big Kickstarter success, but the Pillar is pretty inexpensive ($20), and while not as adjustable, seems simple and lightweight (disclaimer: I just decided to back this myself...).

At $20 ($18 for early birds), this is definitely a nice inexpensive option, and people seem to be backing it pretty quickly. It's raised over 30% of its $20,000 target in just a few days, so it seems likely to hit the goal.

Finally, we've got the Modos, which is a pretty cool concept for totally modular furniture. The main "feature" is the aluminum connectors with three extruded profiles, allowing you to slide in wooden boards of various shapes and sizes to... create almost any kind of furniture you want, with no additional tools. From the video, it certainly looks like you can build some impressive looking furniture with a little creativity, without needing any tools (unless you're cutting/finishing your own boards), that is also easy to take a part, move and rebuild. Among the examples they show are a standing desk stand, a full desk, bookshelves and a stool. But it looks like you could build lots of other stuff as well.

There are a whole bunch of different options listed for ways to back this one, including some where you have to supply your own boards, and others where it comes with the boards. Actually, with so many options, it may be a bit overwhelming for folks trying to decide. Either way, they're off to a pretty quick start. As I'm typing this the project has only been live for a few hours, but already has reached 15% of its goal (and when I started typing this it was at 12%, so... it may be different by the time you read this).

from the well,-maybe-they-do dept

For this week's awesome stuff of interesting or bizarre crowdfunding projects, we're going to go with three crowdfunding projects involving technology for pets. Yes, pets. I've got a cat and a dog and a bunch of fish, and I've never once thought about buying any special technology (beyond basic fish tank stuff) for them, but apparently others like to go a little bit further.

My fish don't seem to do much besides swim around, eat and die all too frequently, but perhaps it's because I'd never thought to give them something fun to do like Fish on Wheels. Yes, fish on wheels. It's basically what it says on the label. A fish-tank with wheels and some computer vision technology to move the vehicle in the direction the fish swims. Bizarrely, they don't have a "campaign video" but rather they do have this YouTube video from a few months ago that has over a million views and had me laughing outloud multiple times, as you watch the fish drive the vehicle.

The video above released back in February just for fun, basically, to demonstrate how you can do cool things with computer vision technology. But, as you can see from the million-plus views, it went kind of viral, and the folks who made it decided to Kickstart it to see if they could actually turn it into a product. The full thing will run you between €199 and €249 depending on how early you are. I'm not sure it'll actually reach its goal. As I type this it's still at just under €5,000, with a target of €40,000, with about three and a half weeks to go. As awesome as the video above is, I'm not entirely sure how I'd feel about having this thing roaming around my house.

How about a gaming console for your dog? That's what CleverPet is trying to do. Actually, it's a WiFi-connected automatic feeder, but with the idea of "challenging" your dog to do certain things to keep it entertained or something. There's a lot of talk about how your dog needs more intellectual stimulation or something. My dog seems to prefer being slumped over in the corner, so I'm not sure about that, but perhaps other dogs are jealous of you and your Xbox.

The video and project page are clear and professional. The actual device runs between $129 and $199 depending on how early an early bird you might be. The project seems to have a decent chance of getting funded, having already hit about 30% of its $100,000 goal in just a couple days.

If you just want a full-featured Wi-Fi connected pet feeder without the whole "gaming console" stuff, perhaps the PetPal is a better option. This thing includes a camera and a speaker so you can watch and communicate with your pet as you feed them from far away. It's an interesting project, but man, the people putting it together should have sought some help in creating both their video and the pitch. The video is way too long (and spends too much time on other stuff before getting to the point) and the pitch itself also focuses too much on the backstory rather than the product.

These are also a lot more expensive than the CleverPet too. To actually get a PetPal you have to spend between $350 and $395. All in all, this project isn't gaining much traction. Nearly a month in with still nearly a month to go (also: leaving a project open too long tends to be a bad idea), they're only at around $12,000 reached, well below their goal of $150,000.

from the step-step-kick dept

For this week's awesome stuff of interesting crowdfunding projects, we'll take a look at a few attempts to rethink people-powered vehicles. This is clearly a popular concept on Kickstarter as it was just a few months ago that we had a few more examples, but these are all new from that last one.

First up, we've got the Me-Mover, which looks like a cross between a step machine and a scooter. In some ways, it reminds me of elliptical bikes, but actually looks much smaller and more functional.

The Me-Movers run about $1,000, which is not crazy compared to some of the alternatives, but also does seem like a lot to pay for a new style of transportation that you haven't tried yet. I'm actually intrigued about testing one out, and thinking about how it could be a good alternative to a bike in many scenarios, but it's difficult to justify plunking down so much money without being able to test it. Of course, it appears that many others have no such qualms, and the Me-Mover has raised over $200,000 (more than double its goal) with just about two days left in its campaign.

Next up is the Paperino, a traditional kick-scooter, but designed to match the style of the classic Vespa motorscooter. While this is still in the concept stage, I actually think these guys may run into legal issues with Piaggio, the makers of the Vespa. I notice that the Paperino team is careful to avoid naming Vespa anywhere, but the style cues are fairly obvious, and most of the scooters they show as their "inspiration" are Vespas. As cool as it looks, you'd think they'd be a bit more careful to not follow the Vespa's design so closely.

Of course, with less than two weeks to go, the campaign is still around 15% of its £25,000 goal, meaning it's highly unlikely to get funded anyway -- so the legal issue may be meaningless.

These next two I'm going to lump together, as they're both similar... and in some ways equally ridiculous. They're both pontoon-based water vehicles with propellers. One is powered by a bicycle and the other by an elliptical. The the Seahorse Bicycle Powered Boat and the Aqua Elliptica (should be obvious how each is powered). Both look fairly bizarre, though, the Aqua Elliptica's presentation is at least moderately more professional.

Of course, neither have any chance of being funded, at all. In fact, neither appears to have sold a single one of their devices. The Bicycle one will run you $3,999 while the elliptical is a relative bargain at $2,500. Between the two projects combined, they've barely received $200 total. So, yeah. If Kickstarter is market research, it would appear that the market is saying "no thanks" on both of these.

from the it's-good-for-you dept

As some folks know, I'm a pretty big believer in standing while you work rather than sitting. It takes a little while to get used to, but these days I greatly prefer standing. While the first few weeks are a bit difficult on your legs and (especially) feet, once you get used to it, it's pretty easy. There's definitely been a trend in sit-stand setups lately, so for this week's awesome stuff post, I thought we'd look at three new crowdfunding projects concerning standing desks.

First up, is a the StandDesk -- which is a standard sit/stand alternating desk. There are lots of these on the market, though they can get a bit pricey. StandDesk's sole claim to fame seems to be that it's a lot cheaper than the competition -- which is true. It's an automated sit-stand desk going for about $400 (not including shipping). Standard automated sit-stand desks tend to be closer to $1,000 or more. When I switched to a sit-stand setup a couple years ago, I deliberately didn't buy such a desk, because it seemed too expensive. Instead, I retrofitted an existing desk with one of these. But the StandDesk definitely brings the price down.

It appears people are pretty excited about this cheaper sit-stand desk as it's already raised over $350,000 (much more than its $50,000 target) with nearly a month left to go.

I'm always intrigued by people trying something new and different, so the ChairBot certainly caught my eye. It's an attempt to still let people get the best of both sitting and standing, while minimizing the harms. I have no idea if there's any real science behind it, but the idea appears to be to have the chair set at your standing height, and the chair splits in two, with either side going down to remove support from one leg or the other. The end result is that you end up "standing" with one leg while "sitting" with the other. And the ChairBot has a timer, so that every so often, you're prompted to switch. The theory is that you get the better posture associated with standing, but not the fatigue that often comes with it (though, again, I've found that goes away after a short adjustment period). You kind of have to watch the video to understand how this works:

While new and different ideas may be interesting, that doesn't mean they're compelling. And this one definitely falls into the not-very-compelling camp. Especially at the insane price of $2,700 (which is apparently the "early bird" price before it goes to $3,700!). You'd have to (1) really, really believe that this is a better system (2) have extra money to throw away and (3) trust that this device that you haven't tested would really work for you in order to plunk down that kind of money. So, it's little surprise that almost no one has actually done so. As I write this, only 1 person has signed up, so it seems unlikely that this project will come anywhere near the $100,000 it seeks by the project completion in two weeks.

Finally, many people point out that you don't need a fancy contraption to have a standing desk. You can just pile some boxes or a shelf on an existing desk and get basically the same thing. So it's interesting to see someone trying to offer a collapsible desktop riser for exactly that purpose. Of course, I'm confused why this is a Kickstarter project, as there are tons of similar desktop risers on the market, and this doesn't appear to be new or unique in any significant way. Nor does it appear the creator put much effort at all into the campaign. It's one of the rare Kickstarter campaigns that doesn't even have a video. Given that, it's not too surprising that so almost no one seems to be interested in buying one (there's just one backer).

from the and-fashionable-function dept

Style and fashion constantly change in capricious, unpredictable and decidedly non-linear ways — but the underlying function of clothing and accessories follows the same path as any other technology: innovation, refinement and improvement. This week's Awesome Stuff takes a look at some practical innovations from the world of wearables.

The ZipSeam

A day comes in most men's lives, usually sometime late in or just after college, when we (a) realize that dress shirts have become the bulk of our wardrobe and (b) look closer and realize that absolutely none of them fit us particularly well. If we're lucky we may have found a few brands with off-the-rack sizes that fit as though tailored, but that's a rare thing indeed. Certain shirt alterations are "easy", but it's all relative (in this case relative to just putting on an ill-fitting shirt, so in other words: hard). But what if trimming baggy sleeves and waists was as simple as snapping an extra piece into place? That's what the ZipSeam aims to make possible:

Innie Shoelace Locks

Shoelaces are among those funny things that have been the same seemingly forever, and yet really feel as though they should have somehow been improved or replaced. The in-many-ways superior option of velcro has been arbitrarily stigmatized; zippers, having all but completely eliminated laces in the realm of shirts and pants, remain a distant second in the shoe game. For whatever reason, people just really like laces on their shoes, while simultaneously realizing that they are often a huge pain. Maybe the solution is the Innie, which does away with bows and excess length while preserving the timeless look of laces:

Vinco Wallets

The constant flood of "revolutionary" new wallets on Kickstarter still shows no sign of slowing down, and these days it's rarer and rarer to see an idea that actually stands out in any meaningful way. But the Vinco wallet is something a little different: instructions and supplies for making your own lifetime supply of temporary paper wallets.

from the oculus-who? dept

Yeah, so you've heard about how Facebook recently bought Oculus, perhaps the most high profile virtual reality company out there, for about $2 billion. But there are a number of others out there working on virtual and augmented reality projects. For this week's awesome stuff post about interesting crowdfunding projects, we thought we'd look at a few projects that seem more geared towards mainstreaming this technology.

First up, we've got the Altergaze -- which might also be described as the poor man's Oculus Rift. It's a 3D printed (and it looks it) contraption for holding your mobile phone, and having an Oculus Rift-like virtual reality experience for a less money. The video clips of people reacting to it are fantastic.

The project is based out of the UK, so the pricing is in £s. If you're willing to do some self-assembly, it'll run you just £50, but can run up to £100 or more if you want an assembled version. The project is designed to be open source hardware, so if you've got your own 3D printer (and access to the right lenses) you could conceivably try to build your own. This project is about halfway to its £50,000 goal after just a day or so. With nearly a month left it'll fly past that goal.

Next up, we've got the Rescape, which creates an augmented reality/virtual reality game on a mobile phone. It uses a funky "game controller," which is more or less a device to make you feel like you're holding a gun in a first person shooter, and which holds your phone on top, through which you can view the game. Tough to describe in words, easy to understand if you watch the video. Basically, it puts you live inside a first person shooter, using your mobile phone, even clothing other "players" in military outfits or whatever. If you ever wanted to "live" in a first person shooter, rather than just watching one on a TV or computer screen, check it out.

This one seems a bit pricey, as you'll have to shell out over $100 for just a single "controller," and that's probably not nearly as fun as having a few in order to play with friends. While this looks like quite a lot of fun, they're having trouble attracting buyers. With just over a week to go, they're only around 20% of their $150,000 goal.

Finally, this last one may be my favorite of the bunch, in part because the Matt Hat makes no effort at all to hide the fact that this is not a consumer product, was started entirely as a joke, but since people seemed interested in it, he'd toss it up on Kickstarter. Basically, it's an attempt to create a DIY augmented reality heads up display, a la a Google Glass, but rather than something like Glass, this is just taking an old baseball cap, a visor and a smartphone -- and then patching it all together. It looks terrible, and the guy behind it doesn't hide that at all. Also, assembling it yourself is required (even though he'll include a baseball cap in the package -- though no indication what kind). That involves cutting a hole in the cap, some rubber bands and a variety of other random things. As Matt himself notes, this is functional, not fashionable. The video showing you how to put it together yourself is fantastic.

This one will run you about $50 Australian, which is about $46 US. Even so, not too many people are going for it. At the time writing this it has just 5 backers after a few days of being live. That's not going to get Matt anywhere near his $50,000 goal. I haven't decided to support this one yet, but there's something tempting about it. For all the talk of people reacting to "Glassholes," I'm really curious how people walking down the street would respond to this monstrosity.

from the write-it-down dept

Sure, sure, we live in a digital age and most of us carry around powerful smartphones and tablets. But there's still just something about being able to write notes or draw that old-fashioned analog way. I've survived for many years with a (growing) pile of notebooks that seem to be given out at random conferences, but for folks who really want perfection out of their notebooks, rather than such a grab-bag approach, there seem to be a never-ending stream of different attempts on Kickstarter to reinvent the notebook. For this week's awesome stuff post, we'll explore three of them.

First up, we've got Furrow Books -- which may be the most straightforward of the bunch. The offer is two different sized basic plain notebooks using high quality paper. The main innovation are differently ruled inserts that you can slip into the notebook if you want to make use of lines (without using lined paper). Nothing fancy, but there's something nice about simple and straightforward sometimes.

There are a bunch of early bird $6 pocket-sized notebooks still available, but if you really like the notebooks, the packages that involve multiple notebooks are probably an even better deal. The overall project is a little over 50% funded with over a month to go, so it's likely to surpass the goal pretty easily.

Next up, we've got the somewhat pretentiously named Da Vinci Notebook (even worse, the "n" in "notebook" is a π in the video, so it reads πotebook -- and, ick, in the description they feel the totally unnecessary need to put a ™ after it). The video itself is a little over the top as well, but none of that means the notebook itself isn't pretty nice. The key innovation here is that the paper is a special kind of paper made from stone -- which they claim is nicer to write on. They also claim it's eco-friendly because there are no trees used, though I'm sure someone out there will ask about the poor stones. Because the paper is stone based, it also has the nice feature of being waterproof. For those of you who like to write underwater -- or at least go swimming with your notebooks. The notebook is also designed so users can add or remove pages, easily, allowing them to insert different versions of the paper, including differently ruled paper, different templates or different sizes -- such as a foldout page. The basic notebook apparently weighs about a pound, so this is a pretty hefty notebook.

This project has already shot well past its $4,000 goal and with three and a half weeks left, it will likely be funded a few multiples of that number. The basic notebook will run you about $12, which may seem steep for a notebook, but remember, it's made of freaking stone.

Finally, we've got Writerase, which goes in a slightly different direction, by making a dry erase notebook. There have been a bunch of dry erase notebooks on Kickstarter over the years, but the concept is definitely pretty useful when done well. Rather than needing new notebooks all the time, you can just erase the stuff you no longer need. Writerase also comes with transparent paper that lets you write on top of other pages without messing them up (they use an example of drawing a calendar frame on one page, placing the transparent page above it and being able to mark up the calendar as necessary.

People seem to really like this particular project, as it's surpassed $25,000, well past its $6,500 target, with a week to go.